The Stuff of Dreams
by MidnightRevel
Summary: Dreams are something that no one expects to be invaded. But that's exactly what's happening on the continent of Terra, a Pokemon only world. Lacey must save this world, all the while battling against those that would use her dreams against her. At least she's got a faithful partner at her side to help her through thick and thin. All she's got to do is learn to stop lying to him.
1. Chapter 1

I thought it was a dream. A stupid, silly little dream. But I learned, as you hopefully will after reading my story, that dreams are so much more. They are gateways to the soul, a vulnerability that leaves our very essence open to anything. Most of the time, only sounds and feelings get in. The thunder from a storm, for example, could change your meadow into rocky crags. Your baby sister's lullaby could turn your stressed out test dream into one of success and victory.

But there are ways to guard against intruders, like an obsession with dragons. Dream about them enough and any intruder would have a hard time navigating past their fire breath and sharp claws. It's all about dreaming about what you think would guard well against any being that could infiltrate your dreams.

Yet, most people don't have these defenses. Adults leave behind pirates and dragons and ferocious zoo animals. They dream of taxes and bills and well… I'd rather not say. But who would want to dive into those kinds of dreams? Idiots, that's who.

It's teenagers that are the most open. They no longer dream of fierce beasts, but they aren't boring dreamers either. Theirs tend to take on adventurous and manic turns. They change so suddenly and without warning, the perfect attraction for anything that would be looking. I guess that's why mine were stolen into. I guess that's how I got into this mess in the first place.


	2. Chapter 2

I had said goodnight to my grandma, let the dog back in and finished the Physics homework Mrs. Veirtz had assigned for the next day. I played my Platinum version for a good hour before my eyelids had started to feel like lead weights. Too bad, because I was just about to challenge Volkner to a battle. I guessed I could challenge him for his badge tomorrow.

Pulling on the beaded string, I clicked off my lamp and burrowed into my blankets. My basement bedroom was far too cold in the winter months like these. I had two comforters lying on top of my other two blankets, just to keep the heat. It didn't take me long to fall asleep in my nest of blankets.

It was strange right from the beginning. It was one of those dreams where you're half-lucid. You know you're dreaming, but you don't quite have the will to change anything. I was dreaming that I was one of my favorite Pokémon, a Froslass.

_I floated up an icy mountainside and entered a cabin, its stone chimney leaking smoke from the tiny fire I found inside. A lady was seated in the small kitchen, at a little island counter, sipping something warm from a mug. Her blonde hair fell in gentle waves all the way to the bottom of her shoulder blades. _

_I placed one of the logs from my arms on the fire, gently so I wouldn't smother it. The lady noticed and sent a smile in my direction. Her pink eyes sparkled in the firelight. _

"Thank you Lacey_," she said in a quiet voice, not unlike my own in the waking world. I was only mildly surprised to hear her use my real name. But it was my dream after all. I smiled in her direction and floated over to the rustic, but elegant kitchen, opening a seemingly random cupboard to retrieve a deep violet mug. "_Would you mind pouring me another cup_?" _

_I nodded and took the lady's cup with my other hand, floating over to the stove where a small kettle sat, steam still shooting out of its spout. Somehow I knew that it wouldn't be tea in it, but rich hot chocolate. I was proven right as the chocolate poured out into both of our cups. I returned to the island and slid the lady her mug, sipping the sugary drink from mine appreciatively. I may have been an ice-type and ghost-type and didn't feel the cold, but whoever says they don't appreciate hot chocolate after a trek through snow is a liar. _

"Lacey, do you think dreams mean anything?"_ she asked. I set down my mug and patted her hand. _

"I don't know. Some people say they are things our hearts are trying to tell us,"_ I told her. _

"But what if our dreams are nothing but nightmares?"_ She continued. I frowned and looked her in the eye. _

"Maybe it means there's something you need to do and your heart is trying to scare you into it. Maybe it's telling you to face your fears."_ She frowned into her mug, not looking me in the eye. I felt the waves of irritation spill off of her, but I didn't say anything. I felt that she would tell me whatever she needed to. She seemed like a fairly open person_.

"I can't sleep at night anymore. I keep having nightmares,"_ she admitted. I stared at her until she met my eyes. I saw the dark circles under her magenta orbs. It concerned me._

"Do you want me to make you a dream-catcher?"_ I asked. She raised an eyebrow, confused as to what I was talking about. She must not have ever seen one before. _

"What? What's a dream-catcher?"

"It's something that keeps away nightmares. If you hang it by your bed, it will capture any nightmares and keep them locked away. But you must never touch the netting, otherwise the nightmares will escape." _She just looked more confused. I rolled my eyes and sipped at my mug. She frowned and stared down at the counter, her hair falling forward to obscure her face. _

_Having finished my mug, I set it in the sink. When I turned back to the lady, she seemed off. She was still staring down, but something about her felt wrong. _

"Would you help me if you could, Lacey?" _she asked quietly._

"Yes. I don't like nightmares much myself, but they are the only dreams you are happy to wake up from. Clouds with silver linings, aren't they?"_ I noticed her fingers shaking, gripping her mug too tight. _"Is there a way I _could_ help?"

_The lady stayed silent, her fingers turning white as she gripped the ceramic mug tighter. Just as I was starting to fear, it shattered in her hands. Shards stuck into her palms and blood started to drip onto the marble countertop. I shrieked like a bird in surprise and grabbed her hands, plucking out shard after shard under the blood. It wasn't until I was nearly done that I noticed the low bouncing sound. She was laughing. _

"Quite the concerned soul, aren't you?"_ she said threateningly. _"Maybe you _can_ help." _I looked up at her, the question I had been about to ask dying on my lips. _

_Her eyes were no longer rosy pink. They were such a dark purple, they were nearly black. Her pupils had shrunk to pinpricks and a manic grin had spread across her face. I dropped her hand to the counter, but it whipped out to grip mine painfully. __**Pain? Since when do dreamers feel pain?**__ I asked myself, only to cry out as she gripped my hand tighter. It felt like whatever bones were in my hand were being ground together. _

"Help me, Lacey," _she said desperately before her eyes went completely black. _"You know you have such pretty eyes. I wonder what they would look like on a string!" _She laughed louder and I tried to pull away. Her other hand shot out to grab my other one, gripping it just as tightly. _

"Let me go!"_ I yelled, wishing I had feet to kick her with. _

"Come save her if you can, you sad little girl. I'll be waiting!"_ Her hair started to bleed black from the roots, black as night, black as her terrifying eyes. She pulled me closer and I felt like I was falling. _

All of a sudden, I wasn't in the cozy cabin any longer. I really was falling. I raced past snowflakes and frigid air that seemed to steal my breath away. I screamed, but the shrill sound was lost in the snow and clouds.

The ground raced towards me, covered in a thick blanket of snow. Jagged spires of brown rocks stuck out of the blanket like needles from a pincushion. I really started to worry when it looked like I would be speared straight on one of the spikes, so close to my final demise.

But the wind pushed at me, blowing me to the far side of the hedgehog rocks. I felt like I should not have done that, that the wound should have done nothing but make me colder. But it felt like any normal breeze, not as frigid as I imagined it would be.

I hit the powdery snow like a rocket, plunging through all three feet of it to smack the ground hard enough to jolt my lungs. I struggled to pull in a breath, the snow going down my throat instead of air. Finally having enough sense, I pushed myself off the ground and out of the snow… or my head at least. The snow went all the way to my chin and it was all I could do to keep it out of my mouth.

In any direction I looked, it was nothing but snow, rock spires and grey clouds. It looked like the mountainside from my dream, but different too. There was no warm cabin to welcome me, just cold and dreary. I didn't call out, for fear of causing an avalanche by shouting too loudly. I shuddered more from a dark feeling of loneliness than the cold.

Seeing I had no choice, I started going in the only promising direction, downward. The mountain was pretty tame, but it had just enough of a slope to let me know which way was down. Pushing through the snow was a pain, but not as much as trying to figure out what had happened.

I figured I had been dreaming, but I had felt pain. I knew for a fact that dreams didn't cause pain. I'd had too many murder nightmares to rule that it had just been an overactive dream. But then there was the fact that I was still a Froslass. I was not a Froslass. I had been perfectly human when I went to bed. My gran had even put my hair in a braid so it would be wavy for the next day.

But here I was with the thin arms and the floating body. I knew by feel that I had the ice horns and ghost-like mask face. So I was still dreaming… wasn't I?

* * *

_I cannot believe they sent me all the way to this stupid mountain for their stupid stuff. They could have at least waited for the blizzard to pass before they started crying. I have to man up and tell them no once in a while…_

I slogged through the chin high snow, my paws beyond frozen despite the lined boots Johan had given me for the trip. Lucario were not meant for the cold. We were meant for rocks and caves and sparring temples and dojos. Just because I was part steel-type, didn't mean I was immune to the cold. It was freaking freezing up here!

"Get it together, Luciano, you're not a baby anymore. Grow a pair and find their bag so you can go back home," I told myself. I had a habit of thinking out loud. It may have been weird, but I didn't exactly have a partner to talk to. Floatzel had fallen off that cliff so long ago… "Stop it! It wasn't your fault and you know it. You've already slammed that Ariados in prison for the rest of his life. Stop thinking about it."

I burrowed deeper into the woolen scarf Whimsicott had made me and slogged even faster. I wanted to be in a warm bed sometime tonight and that meant putting the pedal to the metal. Cubchoo had said he dropped the bag near the tree line, where the pines all melted into nothing. There was a cave there that he and his sister stayed in. He said he must have left it there before they came back down to town to avoid the blizzard.

I squinted at the trees ahead of me, hoping to see a sign of the rock spires I knew would be in sight around the cave Cubchoo was talking about. I caught a glimpse of one of the brown rocks. Smiling to myself, I allowed a quick victory jump.

Shoveling the snow aside as quickly as I could, I headed towards a rock spire that looked like it had a sharp triangle at the top. I knew the cave would be past that, down a narrow path on the side of the cliff face.

I passed the spire and rounded the corner, slowing down so my booted paws could find the edge under the snow. I set my left paw on the cliff, steadying my body so I would not slip and fall to my doom. I took it step by step, only inching along the icy ridge.

When my left paw finally dipped into space, I smiled under my scarf and hurried into the cave, grateful to be out of the wind and the snow. My fur instantly started to warm up. I knew I liked it long for a reason. I peeled the scarf off my snout and sniffed at the air. I could smell the remnants of Cubchoo's fire and his sharp smell lingered further into the cave.

The bag was only five meters away from the entrance, the strap looped around a rock. I unwound it and checked the inside, glad to find nothing had been taken. I threw it over my shoulder, lifted up my scarf again, and headed out.

The snow hit my face like a slap, but I endured it knowing that I would be back home soon. Cubchoo owed me two favors for this, and I planned on making him repay one right away. I grinned at the thought as I plowed through the path I made coming up.

Something at the rock spire caught my eye as I got closer. I hadn't seen it when I trekked towards the cave, but now that I was walking the other direction, I noticed the stark contrast I had missed before. It looked like a figure had slumped against the rock, only being held up by the snow around it.

I hurried towards it, concerned that it was a person stuck all the way up here. I knew most of the citizen's in town couldn't last a whole night up here, not even most of the guild members could do it. I couldn't do it. I nearly growled in frustration when I reached it.

It was a Froslass, an unconscious Froslass. She must have been looking for somewhere to get out of the blizzard. I figured she must have collapsed out of exhaustion, just a bit of a ways from a safe haven. But… lying on this side of the spire… was she going down the mountain? I know I'd seen a Froslass or two in the wilds before but not on this mountain. Most lived on Mt. Jilo or in the ice plains up north.

I looked back at the cave, startled to see it obscured by the falling snow. She must not have seen it clearly then. I grabbed her around the waist and lifted her up to my shoulder. She was surprisingly light, even for a ghost-type. It was like she was nothing but a hollow shell.

I blew a snowflake out of my eye and headed down my swiftly disappearing path. If I didn't hurry, I'd get lost before I could even get out of the pine trees that did nothing to shield my path from the falling snow. So, hiking the Froslass up higher on my shoulder, I started to plow through the ever deepening snow.

* * *

Something or someone was poking me. I did not appreciate it. Mumbling obscenities to myself, I rolled over to my side, putting my back to the annoyance. I caught them complaining about my language. I laughed sleepily and flapped a hand at them.

"Five more minutes," I said quietly, my voice barely louder than a breeze.

"What?" they asked, drawling the word like they were from the South.

"Five minutes," I repeated louder. "Then I'll get up for school."

"You sure she didn't bump her head?" a deeper voice asked, distinctly male in timbre. He sounded nice. I liked the way his voice sounded.

"There's no sign of any concussion," the androgynous, southern voice said. One of them lifted my eyelid, flooding it with light.

"Ey!" I shouted. "Can't a girl get some sleep without being prodded?" I was awake now. Awake enough to notice that the two people crowded near my bed were a Lucario and a Pikachu. I blinked and looked back and forth between the two, my mind stalling on any explanation as to what the hell was going on.

"You know, you could say thanks!" the Pikachu snapped at me. I dared a quick look at its tail to see it was indeed a male. "Why do you always bring me the ungrateful patients?" This question was directed at the Lucario. He held up his black paws in surrender.

"Sorry Rai!" he said quickly. "But I'll make sure to add a big tip in your fee."

"Damn right you will," Rai said with an approving nod. He turned back to me quickly, his small black eyes intense. "No climbing back up that mountain unless you know where you're going. You are going to stay in town while the blizzard blows over. And that's a medical order." I nodded quickly, hoping it would get the scary little mouse away from me. It did. He left the room with a huff and a flick of his tail.

"Sorry about Doc. Raimundo. He can get a bit scary," the Lucario said, rubbing the back of his head. "You feeling any better?"

"Um… yeah? What happened?" All I could remember was that I was trying to find my way down the mountain in the snow. I never remembered passing out or falling asleep. I didn't even really remember anything past weaving in and out of the rock spires that dotted the snow laden mountain.

"Well, as far as I can guess, you collapsed out of exhaustion on the mountain. The blizzard must have blocked your view because there was a perfectly good cave not twenty meters from where you were," the Lucario explained. "I had to get something for a friend of mine in that cave and I found you half buried in snow on my way back. But I'm glad you're okay."

"Umm… th-thanks, for taking care of me," I finally stuttered out. I hadn't ever met anyone as nice as this Lucario. Most of the people I knew back in my world were not as Good Samaratin-y as he seemed to be. "Where are we exactly?" I knew I wouldn't recognize the answer, but I needed something. Waking up to find a Lucario and a Pikachu was not something that anyone would find comforting, least of all me. Hell, finding any Pokémon was usually not a good thing. They were fiction for fuck's sake!

"This is Rowanwood Town. It's really not that far from Mt. Hakuro. Oh, that's where I found you last night." I took in the details without thinking much of them. I was still kind of tweaking out about the fact I was a Froslass. I ran my hands over my head, trying not to flinch when my small fingers met the cold ice horns. I breathed out slowly, allowing my mind to quickly adjust to the circumstances.

I was always a kind of a go with the flow person. I never really freaked out at many things. I mean, my best friend Mel had told me she was pregnant this year and all I did was smile and tell her to name it after me if it was a girl. When my mom moved out, I just said 'good riddance' and moved on with my life. So I guess that's why I didn't really freak out like I should have. I took another deep breath and let it all out slowly.

"So, this is Rowanwood?" I asked, pretending that I knew what I was talking about. "I didn't realize I had traveled so far." I didn't know why I felt the need to lie to him, but at least his face relaxed and he seemed to ease his worry.

"Where are you from?" he asked, sitting himself in a chair near the wooden cabinet next to the bed I was sitting on. "You kind of sound like you're from out west." I sounded like? So that meant wherever this was had accents and mannerisms that were distinct to different parts of the world. Good to know.

"All over," I shrugged, "nowhere and everywhere. I travel a lot. But you're being rude. You haven't even told me your name." He looked embarrassed and I bet he must have been blushing under his shaggy fur. I never thought Lucario would have such long fur, but then again, I never really thought about Pokémon as anything other than a game and a cartoon.

"Luciano," he replied. "My name is Luciano."

"Loo_cha_no?" I repeated. That was an Italian-ish name. I kind of liked it. It seemed to fit him rather well. "Nice to meet you, Luciano, I'm Lacey." I held out my hand for a handshake and he stared at it like he thought it was some weird bug. I rolled my eyes and sighed. "Hold out your paw… no, the other one." I grabbed his paw and shook it up and down. He looked so confused, it was near hilarious. But I bit my tongue out of respect. It probably wasn't a common custom around here.

"What was that?" he asked, looking at his paw like I had smeared something on it.

"It's a handshake. It's a common way to greet new people where I'm from."

"Which is?" I mentally slapped myself for being a hypocrite with my words. I just told him I traveled a lot and now I just mentioned a home town. Quick, Brain, think!

"A far off, little place that doesn't exist anymore," I blurted. It was the first thing I could think of. At least he didn't ask about it any further. Judging by his face, he felt embarrassed for asking. "It's all right, don't worry about it. I was real young when I had to leave. I really don't remember much about it anyway."

"Sorry anyways." I smiled a bit, touched that he would worry so much.

"Luciano. Stop apologizing." He caught himself in the middle of another apology and I laughed. My stomach took that time to yell at me. I blushed and it was Luciano's turn to laugh.

"Here," he said, grabbing a bowl off the cabinet, offering it to me. "Raimundo's always got the best fruits. Take your pick." I searched through the unfamiliar produce and settled on one that looked like an apple.

Luciano took a green one with yellow spots. The apple seemed to be fairly similar to the kind I was used to. It crunched when I bit into it, a crisply sweet flavor to it. It left a nice taste in my mouth, a bit like grapes and apples combined. I devoured it and three more quickly. I hadn't quite realized I was so hungry. Luciano laughed at me.

"Wow, when's the last time you ate?" I shrugged in response. I really didn't know how time transferred from Earth to here. It would have been just a few hours before I found myself on Mt. Hakuro. But Luciano had said that was last night.

"Yesterday morning?" I guessed. Luciano had that concerned look on his muzzle again. "Oh stop worrying. I'm not some glass doll."

"I dunno, you ice-types are kind of fragile," Luciano teased. I laughed and punched at his shoulder.

"You won't be saying that once I start kicking your butt for insulting me," I responded. Luciano just rolled with it. I had to admit, I was starting to think things may not have been so bad. At least I had somewhat of a friend. I hadn't had many friends before… two actually, but that's off topic. "So, am I stuck here or is there a town out there that I can see?"

"Well, there is a blizzard raging outside…" I slumped and stuck my head in my hands.

"So, you got any cards?" Luciano laughed and pulled a set out of the cabinet.

"Rai's always got cards. It's how he cheats me out of my money most of the time. Which game do you want to play?" I flipped through the cards and thought for a minute.

"Ever played Crazy Eights?" I asked. Luciano just looked confused, so I started to explain as I shuffled the cards. Tonight was going to be an interesting night.

* * *

**Welcome to my first story! Sorry about the first chapter only being like 200 words. But at least it's not 5,000. Please read and review. I would love to hear your criticism and your opinions. This is kinda a PMD story, but also kinda not. Things happen, humans become Pokemon, things threaten the world, you know all that by now. Have fun! ~~Revel~~**


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